I have been working out for about 3 months now. I’m trying to get ripped and build a body like Brad Pitt in the movie “Fight Club” but I don’t even look close to his physique. I still have a lot of fat on my stomach, back and love handles. Nothing on my body is really toned at all.
I’m basing my diet on a 3,000 calorie a day meal plan. I eat a bowl of Kashi high protein cereal in the morning at 6am and then at 8am I eat 2 bananas and a healthy protein bar. At 10am I eat an all natural peanut butter sandwich on whole wheat bread. At noon I eat another peanut butter sandwich or sometimes leftovers from the night before and then another peanut butter sandwich at 2pm. At 4pm I eat 2 red apples. At 6pm I eat dinner which can be a variety of different foods but I always try to eat healthy. I workout at 7pm for about 30 minutes to an hour. Then I have a small post-workout snack like a glass of orange juice, a protein bar or a peanut butter sandwich. What type of changes should I make to lose more fat and get closer to that ultra ripped look?
Brad Pitt was extremely lean when he played the famous role of “Tyler Durden” in the popular movie “Fight Club”. The interesting thing to remember is that Pitt only weighed 155-160 pounds when he starred in that role and he isn’t a short guy (he’s 6 feet tall). This is very lean for a man at that height and even though Pitt may have looked much heavier, his body fat was so low (5-6%) that he appeared much bigger than he really was. One of the benefits of getting extremely lean is the level of vascularity you will reach when you get your body fat percentage this low. This is when every single muscle fiber pops through your skin and your forearms and biceps look like they have tree branch veins running through them!
In order to get that “Brad Pitt” ripped look, it really just boils down to your diet along with a solid cardio routine. Your current diet is less than ideal for getting ultra lean and you need to clean it up a lot if you really want to start shedding body fat. The first thing you need to do is cut out all those peanut butter sandwiches and all the processed foods in your diet. All natural peanut butter is a great source of healthy fats but remember that fat contains twice the amount of calories per gram when compared to protein and carbs. That means that those sandwiches pack on the calories very quickly especially when you combine peanut butter with two slices of bread multiple times a day. If you love peanut butter, keep it to 1-2 small servings a day (1-2 tbs per serving) and try to eat it with a low carb food like spreading it on celery or even having it with a few slices of an apple (Fuji apples are amazing with peanut butter).
Since you are carrying extra body fat around your abs, back and love handles, you really need to decrease your calories from 3,000 per day down to around 2,500 calories a day and make sure to focus on eating nutrient dense whole foods for the bulk of your diet. Right now, you are not eating the optimum foods to help you reach your goals of a shredded physique with ripped 6-pack abs like Brad Pitt. I’m not going to lie and tell you it’s easy. It’s not! You will need to be extremely disciplined and bust your butt doing lots of consistent cardio to reach a level of body fat that’s under 10% which is the point where you will start seeing great definition in your muscles and overall physique.
For specific foods, you need to focus on eating lean protein, healthy starchy carbs and tons of fibrous veggies. Watch out for overdoing it on fruit also (remember those apple slices with peanut butter I recommended earlier). Fruit is great for getting in your vitamins and minerals but since fructose fills up liver glycogen stores and not muscle glycogen, it has a tendency “spill over” and end up getting converted to body fat. Replace fruits with healthy veggies like broccoli and see how your body changes.
Sample Daily Meal Plan
- Breakfast: Egg white veggie omelet (8 egg whites, 1 yolk, mushrooms, broccoli, green peppers, 1 tbs of olive oil).
- Snack: Whey protein shake, 1-2 tbs of all natural peanut butter and half an apple.
- Lunch: 1 cup of brown rice, 8 ounces of chicken breast, 1 cup of green beans.
- Snack: Whey protein shake, handful of nuts (almonds or walnuts).
- Dinner: 8 ounces of salmon, stir fry veggies (broccoli, onions, squash, mushrooms, 1 tbs olive oil), small green salad.
Along with your diet, the amount of cardio that you implement into your fitness program is absolutely crucial for burning off fat and achieving a lean and ripped physique. You need to be doing at about 45-60 minutes of cardio 5-7 days per week. My recommendation is to find something you really like doing versus forcing yourself to do an hour of cardio that you hate. If you love playing basketball or tennis, do it! These are great cardio exercises that not only burn calories but also work your hand-eye coordination and help improve your agility. If you like doing cardio in the gym, focus on doing exercises like walking on the treadmill (at an incline), the elliptical machine, jumping rope and riding the stationary bike. Always do your cardio workout after weight training to maximize fat burning.
It’s important to remember that all the training in the world will not get you closer to looking like Brad Pitt in Fight Club if you are eating the wrong foods. Your diet is really the key and it’s the most important aspect of your fitness plan that you want to focus on when your goal is to shed excess body fat and get absolutely ripped!
1 Comment
Brad Pitt is 5’10” tall and his weight in the movie is 74kg (163 lbs). His an ectomorph with privileged genetics. If you don’t have that, you can’t have his body. However, you can adapt your training and diet to get the best of your anatomy!